Chapter 9

Without further hesitation--in fact, with almost desperate haste, as if wishing to dispose of a disagreeable duty--he ripped open the buttons of his waistcoat and removed it at the same time with his coat, as if the two had been but one garment. He tossed them into the bottom of the buggy in a disorderly heap. But Mrs. Kimbal rescued them, separated them, folded them neatly, and stowed them under the seat.

Saterlee made no comment. He was thinking of the state of a shirt that he had had on since early morning, and was wondering how, with his elbows pressed very tightly to his sides, he could possibly manage to unlace his boots. He made one or two tentative efforts. But Mrs. Kimbal seemed to divine the cause of his embarrassment.

"_Please_," she said, "don't mind anything--on my account."

He reached desperately, and regardlessly, for his boots, unlaced them, and took them off.

"Why," exclaimed Mrs. Kimbal, "_both_ your heels need darning!"

Saterlee had tied his boots together, and was fastening them around his neck by the remainder of the laces.

"I haven't anybody to do my darning now," he said. "My girls are all at school, except two that's married. So--" He finished his knot, took the reins in his left hand and the whip in his right.

At first the old mare would not budge. Switching was of no avail. Saterlee brought down the whip upon her with a sound like that of small cannon. She sighed and walked gingerly into the river.

The water rose slowly (or the river bottom shelved very gradually), and they were half-way across before it had reached the hubs of the wheels. But the mare appeared to be in deeper. She refused to advance, and once more turned and stared with a kind of wistful rudeness. Then she saw the whip, before it fell, made a desperate plunge, and floundered forward into deep water--but without the buggy.

One rotten shaft had broken clean off, both rotten traces, and the reins, upon which hitherto there had been no warning pull, were jerked from Saterlee's loose fingers. The old mare reached the further shore presently, swimming and scrambling upon a descending diagonal, stalked sedately up the bank, and then stood still, only turning her head to look at the buggy stranded in mid-stream. The sight appeared to arouse whatever of youthful mischief remained in the feeble old heart. She seemed to gather herself for a tremendous effort, then snorted once, and kicked thrice--three feeble kicks of perhaps six inches in the perpendicular.

Mrs. Kimbal exploded into laughter.

"Wouldn't you know she was a woman?" she said.

But Saterlee was climbing out of the buggy.

"Now," said he, "if you'll just tie my coat round your neck by the sleeves--let the vest go hang--and then you'll have to let me carry you."

Mrs. Kimbal did as she was told. But the buggy, relieved at last of all weight, slid off sidewise with the current, turned turtle, and was carried swiftly down-stream. Saterlee staggering, for the footing was uncertain, and holding Mrs. Kimbal high in his arms, started for shore. The water rose above his waist, and kept rising. He halted, bracing himself against the current.

"Ma'am," he said in a discouraged voice, "it's no use. I've just got to let you get wet. We've got to swim to make it."

"All right," she said cheerfully.

"Some folks," he said, "likes to go overboard sudden; some likes to go in by degrees."

"Between the two for me," said Mrs. Kimbal. "Not suddenly, but firmly and without hesitation."

She gave a little shivery gasp.

"It's not really cold," she said. "How strong the current pulls. Will you have to swim and tow me?"

"Yes," he said.

"Then wait," she said. "Don't let me be carried away."

He steadied her while she drew the hat-pins from her hat and dropped it as carelessly on the water as if that had been her dressing-table. Then she took down her hair. It was in two great brown, shining braids. The ends disappeared in the water, listing down-stream.

Shorn of her hat and her elaborate hair-dressing, the lady was no longer showy, and Saterlee, out of the tail of an admiring eye, began to see real beauties about her that had hitherto eluded him. Whatever other good qualities and virtues she may have tossed overboard during a stormy and unhappy life, she had still her nerve with her. So Saterlee told himself.

"It will be easier, won't it," she said, "if you have my hair to hold by? I think I can manage to keep on my back."

"May I, Ma'am?" said Saterlee.

She laughed at his embarrassment. And half-thrust the two great braids into the keeping of his strong left hand.

A moment later Saterlee could no longer keep his footing.

"Now, Ma'am," he said, "just let yourself go."

And he swam to shallow water, not without great labor, towing Mrs. Kimbal by the hair. But here he picked her up in his arms, this time with no word spoken, and carried her ashore. Some moments passed.

"Well," she said, laughing, "aren't you going to put me down?"

"Oh!" said he, terribly confused, "I forgot. I was just casting an eye around for that horse. She's gone."

"Never mind--we'll walk."

"It'll be heavy going, wet as you are," said he.

"I'll soon be dry in this air," she said.

Saterlee managed to pull his boots on over his wet socks, and Mrs. Kimbal, having given him his wet coat from her neck, stooped and wrung as much water as she could from her clothes.

It was now nearly dark, but they found the road and went on.

"What time is it?" she asked.

"My watch was in my vest," said Saterlee.

"How far to Carcasonne House?"

"'Bout thirty miles."

She did not speak again for some time.

"Well," she said, a little hardness in her voice, "you'll hardly be in time to steer your boy away from my girl."

"No," said he, "I won't. An' you'll hardly be in time to steer your girl away from my boy."

"Oh," she said, "you misconceive me entirely, Mr. Saterlee. As far as I'm concerned, my only regret _now_ is that I shan't be in time to dance at the wedding."

"Ma'am?" he said, and there was something husky in his voice.

V

About midnight they saw a light, and, forsaking what they believed in hopeful moments to be the road, they made for it across country. Across open spaces of sand, into gullies and out of gullies, through stinging patches of yucca and prickly pear, through breast-high chaparral, meshed, knotted, and matted, like a clumsy weaving together of very tough ropes, some with thorns, and all with sharp points and elbows.

They had long since dispensed with all conversation except what bore on their situation. Earlier in the night the darkness and the stars had wormed a story of divorce out of Mrs. Kimbal, and Saterlee had found himself longing to have the man at hand and by the throat.

And she had prattled of her many failures on the stage and, latterly, of her more successful ventures, and of a baby boy that she had had, and how that while she was off playing "on the road" her husband had come in drunk and had given the baby the wrong medicine. And it was about then that she had left off conversing.

For in joy it is hard enough to find the way in the dark, while for those in sorrow it is not often that it can be found at all.

The light proved to be a lantern upon the little porch of a ramshackle shanty. An old man with immense horn-rimmed spectacles was reading by it out of a tattered magazine. When the couple came close, the old man looked up from his reading, and blessed his soul several times.

"It do beat the Dutch!" he exclaimed in whining nasal tones, "if here ain't two more."

"Two more what?" said Saterlee.

"It's the floods, I reckon," whined the old man. "There's three on the kitchen floor and there's two ladies in my bed. That's why I'm sittin' up. There wa'n't no bed for a man in his own house. But I found this here old copy of the _Medical Revoo_, 'n' I'm puttin' in the time with erysipelis."

"But," said Saterlee, "you must find some place for this lady to rest. She is worn out with walking and hunger."

"Stop!" whined the old man, smiting his thigh, "if there ain't that there mattress in the loft! And I clean forgot, and told the boys that I hadn't nothin' better than a rug or two 'n the kitchen floor."

"A mattress!" exclaimed Saterlee. "Splendid! I guess you can sleep some on anything near as good as a mattress. Can't you, ma'am?"

"Indeed I could!" she said. "But you have been through as much as I have--more. I won't take it."

The old man's whine interrupted.

"Ain't you two married?" he said.

"Nop," said Saterlee shortly.

"Now ain't that ridiculous?" meditated the old man; "I thought you was all along." His eyes brightened behind the spectacles. "It ain't for me to interfere _in_ course," he said, "but hereabouts I'm a Justice of the Peace." Neither spoke.

"I could rouse up the boys in the kitchen for witnesses," he insinuated.

Saterlee turned suddenly to Mrs. Kimbal, but his voice was very humble.

"Ma'am?" he suggested.

MR. HOLIDAY

Mr. Holiday stepped upon the rear platform of his car, the Mishawaka, exactly two seconds before the express, with a series of faint, well-oiled jolts, began to crawl forward and issue from beneath the glass roof of the Grand Central into the damp, pelting snow. Mr. Holiday called the porter and told him for the good of his soul that fifty years ago travelling had not been the easy matter that it was to-day. This off his mind, he pulled an _Evening Post_ from his pocket and dismissed the porter by beginning to read. He still wore his overcoat and high silk hat. These he would not remove until time had proved that the temperature of his car was properly regulated.

He became restless after a while and hurried to the forward compartment of the Mishawaka to see if all his trunks had been put on. He counted them over several times, and each time he came to the black trunk he sniffed and wrinkled up his nose indignantly. The black trunk was filled with the most ridiculous and expensive rubbish that he had ever been called upon to purchase. When his married daughters and his wife had learned, by "prying," that he was going to New York on business, they had gathered about him with lists as long as his arm, and they had badgered him and pestered him until he had flown into a passion and snatched the lists and thrown them on the floor. But at that the ladies had looked such indignant, heart-broken daggers at him that, very ungraciously, it is true, and with language that made their sensibilities hop like peas in a pan, he had felt obliged to relent. He had gathered up the lists and stuffed them into his pocket, and had turned away with one bitter and awful phrase.

"Waste not, want not!" he had said.

He now glared and sniffed at the black trunk, and called for the porter.

"Do you know what's in that trunk?" he said in a pettish, indignant voice. "It's full of Christmas presents for my grandchildren. It's got crocodiles in it and lions and Billy Possums and music-boxes and dolls and yachts and steam-engines and spiders and monkeys and doll's furniture and china. It cost me seven hundred and forty-two dollars and nine cents to fill that trunk. Do you know where I wish it was?"

The porter did not know.

"I wish it was in Jericho!" said Mr. Holiday.

He fingered the brass knob of the door that led forward to the regular coaches, turned it presently, and closed it behind him.

His progress through the train resembled that of a mongoose turned loose in new quarters. Nothing escaped his prying scrutiny or love of petty information. If he came to a smoking compartment, he would thrust aside the curtain and peer in. If it contained not more than three persons, he would then enter, seat himself, and proceed to ask them personal questions. It was curious that people so seldom resented being questioned by Mr. Holiday; perhaps his evident sincerity in seeking for information accounted for this; perhaps the fact that he was famous, and that nearly everybody in the country knew him by sight. Perhaps it is impossible for a little gentleman of eighty, very smartly dressed, with a carnation in his buttonhole, to be impertinent. And then he took such immense and childish pleasure in the answers that he got, and sometimes wrote them down in his note-book, with comments, as:

"Got into conversation with a lady with a flat face. She gave me her age as forty-two. I should have said nearer sixty.

"Man of fifty tells me has had wart on nose for twenty-five years; has had it removed by electrolysis twice, but it persists. Tell him that I have never had a wart."

Etc., etc.

He asked people their ages, whence they came, where they were going; what they did for a living; if they drank; if they smoked; if their parents were alive; what their beefsteak cost them a pound; what kind of underwear they wore; what church they attended; if they shaved themselves; if married; if single; the number of their children; why they did not have more children; how many trunks they had in the baggage-car; whether they had seen to it that their trunks were put on board, etc. Very young men sometimes gave him joking and sportive answers; but it did not take him long to catch such drifts, and he usually managed to crush their sponsors thoroughly. For he had the great white dignity of years upon his head; and the dignity of two or three hundred million dollars at his back.

During his peregrinations he came to a closed door which tempted him strangely. It was probably the door of a private state-room; it might be the door of a dust closet. He meditated, with his finger upon the knob. "I'll just open it slowly," he thought, "and if I make a mistake I'll say I thought it was a smoking compartment."

As the door opened a smell of roses came out. Huddled into the seat that rides forward was a beautiful girl, very much dishevelled and weeping bitterly, with her head upon one of those coarse white pillows which the Pullman Company provides. Her roses lay upon the seat opposite. She was so self-centred in her misery that she was not aware that the door had been opened, a head thrust in and withdrawn, and the door closed. But she was sure that a still, small voice had suddenly spoken in her mind, and said: "Brace up." Presently she stopped crying, as became one who had been made the subject of a manifestation, and began to put her hair in order at the narrow mirror between the two windows. Meanwhile, though Mr. Holiday was making himself scarce, as the saying is, he was consumed with interest to know why the beautiful girl was weeping. _And he meant to find out_.

But in the meantime another case provoked his interest. A handsome woman of thirty-five occupied Section 7 in Car 6. She was dressed in close-fitting black, with a touch of white at her throat and wrists.

Mr. Holiday had seen her from the extreme end of the car, and by the time he was opposite to where she sat it became necessary for him to have an answer to the questions that had presented themselves about her. Without any awkward preliminaries, he bent over and said:

"I've been wondering, ma'am, if you are dressed in black for your father or your husband."

She looked up, recognized the famous eccentric, and smiled.

"Won't you sit down, Mr. Holiday?" she said, and made room for him.

"I wear black," she said, when he had seated himself, "not because I am in mourning for anybody, but because I think it's becoming to me. You see, I have very light-colored hair."

"Does all that hair grow on your head?" Mr. Holiday asked, simply and without offence.

"Every bit of it," she said.

"I have a splendid head of hair, too," he commented. "But there's a young man in the car back of this who'll be twenty-two years of age in February, and he's got more dandruff than hair. Where are you going?"

"Cleveland."

"Is that your home?"

"No. I'm a bird of passage."

"What is your name?"

"I am Miss Hampton," she said, and she hoped that he might have heard of her. But he hadn't. And she explained herself. "I'm to play at the Euclid Theatre Christmas night."

"An actor?" he said.

"Well," she admitted, "some say so, and some won't hear of it."

"How much money do you earn?"

"Two hundred dollars a week."

Mr. Holiday wrote that in his note-book.

"I've got some little nieces and nephews in New York," she volunteered. "Don't you think it's hard to be a genuine aunt and to have to spend Christmas alone in a strange place?"

"Not for two hundred dollars a week," said Mr. Holiday unsympathetically. "You ought to thank your stars and garters."

Presently, after patting her on the back with two fingers, he rose, bowed, and passed on down the aisle. On the right, in the end section, was a very old couple, with snow-white hair, and a great deal of old-fashioned luggage. Mr. Holiday greeted them cordially, and asked their ages. The old gentleman was seventy-six and proud of it; the old lady was seventy. Mr. Holiday informed them that he was eighty, but that they were probably the next oldest people on the train. Anyway, he would find out and let them know. They smiled good-naturedly, and the old lady cuddled a little against the old gentleman, for it was cold in that car. Mr. Holiday turned abruptly.

"I forgot to ask you where you are going?" he said.

They told him that they were going to spend Christmas with their daughter and son-in-law and the new baby in Cleveland. It was a long journey. But the season made them feel young and strong. Did Mr. Holiday think there was any danger of being delayed by the snow? It was coming down very fast. They could not remember ever to have been in a sleeping-car when it was snowing so hard outside. Mr. Holiday said that he would ask the conductor about the snow, and let them know.

In the smoking compartment of the next car forward sat a very young man, all alone. He looked at once sulky and frightened. He wasn't smoking, but was drumming on the window sill with his finger nails. He had a gardenia in his button-hole, and was dressed evidently in his very best suit--a handsome dark gray, over a malaga-grape-colored waistcoat. In his necktie was a diamond horseshoe pin.

"Young man," said Mr. Holiday, seating himself, "what makes you look so cross?"

The young man started to say, "None of your business," but perceived in time the eager face and snow-white hair of his questioner, and checked himself.

"Why," he said tolerantly, "do I look as savage as all that?"

"It isn't money troubles," said Mr. Holiday, "or you would have pawned that diamond pin."

"Wouldn't you be cross," said the young man, "if you had to look forward to sitting up all night in a cold smoking compartment?"

"Can't you get a berth?"

"I had a drawing-room," said the young man, "but at the last minute I had to give it up to a lady."

Mr. Holiday's eyes twinkled with benign interest. He had connected the gardenia in the young man's coat with the roses of the girl who was weeping.

"I know," he said, "drawing-room, Car 5. She was crying, but I told her to brace up, and I guess she's stopped."

The young man jumped to his feet.

"Oh!" he said.

Mr. Holiday chuckled.

"I was right," he said. "I've been right seven times out of the ten for twenty-five years. I've kept a record."

Upon an impulse the young man checked his headlong inclination to rush to the girl who was weeping.

"If you are right as often as that," he said, "for God's sake tell me what to do."

"Certainly," said Mr. Holiday, "and it won't cost you a cent. What's the matter?"

"_She_" said the young man with an accent, for there was but the one, "came to the station to see me off. She gave me this." He touched the gardenia gently. "I gave her some roses. Just as the train started to pull out I dared her to come with me ... she came!"

"Tut--tut!" said Mr. Holiday.

"What are we to do?" cried the young man.

"Go back and sit with her," said Mr. Holiday, "and leave the door wide open. I'm going through the train now to see who's on board; so don't worry. Leave it all to me."

The last car forward before you came to the baggage-car and the express car was a common day coach. It was draughty. It had been used as a smoker in a period not so very remote. A dog must have passed an uncomfortable night in it.

Near the rear door sat a man in a new derby hat and a new black coat. Further forward on the same side three children had stuffed themselves into one seat. The middle child, a well-grown girl of thirteen or fourteen, seemed by her superior height to shelter the little tots at her side. Only the blue imitation sailor caps of these appeared above the top of the seat; and the top of each cap, including that worn by the older girl, had a centrepiece of white about the size of a gentleman's visiting card. Mr. Holiday promised himself the pleasure of investigating these later. In the meanwhile his interest was excited by the ears of the man in the new derby. They were not large, but they had an appearance of sticking out further than was necessary; and Mr. Holiday was about to ask their owner the reason why, when he noticed for himself that it was because the owner's hair had been cut so very, very short. Indeed, he had little gray eighth-inch bristles instead of hair. Mr. Holiday wondered why. He seated himself behind the man, and leaned forward. The man stirred uneasily.

"I should think you'd be afraid of catching cold in this draughty car with your hair cut so short," said Mr. Holiday.

"I am," said the man tersely.

"Why did you let them cut it so short then?"

"Let them!" grunted the man, with ineffable scorn. "Let them! You'd have let them!"

"I would not," retorted Mr. Holiday crisply. "My wife cuts my hair for me, just the way I tell her to."

The man turned a careworn, unhappy face.

"My wife used to cut mine," he said. "But then I--I got into the habit of having it done for me.... Ever been to Ohio Penitentiary, mister? ... That's the finest tonsorial parlor in America--anything from a shave to the electric treatment."

"Ohio Penitentiary is a jail for felons," said Mr. Holiday severely.

"Quite so," said the man, "as I was telling you."

His voice had a plaintive, subdued note of defiance in it. It was that of a person who is tired of lying and beating about the bush.

"When did you get out?" asked Mr. Holiday simply.

"Eight days ago," said the man, "and when I get good and sick of looking for jobs and getting turned down--I guess I'll go back."

"First they make you work," said Mr. Holiday with a pleased chuckle, "and then they won't let you work. That's the law. But you take my advice--you fool 'em!"

"I never fooled anybody," said the man, and he ripped a holy name from the depths of his downheartedness.

Mr. Holiday had extracted his note-book, and under cover of the seat-back was preparing to take notes and make comments.

"What did you use to do for a living--before?" he asked.

"I was teller in a bank."

"And what happened?"

"Then," said the man, "the missus had twins, followed by typhoid fever." His admissions came with hopeless frankness. "And I couldn't pay for all that luxury. So I stole."

"What bank were you teller in?"

"The Painsville Bank--Painsville. I'm going to them now to--to see if they won't let up. The wife says that's the thing to do--go right to the boil of trouble and prick it."

"What did your wife do while you were away?" asked Mr. Holiday delicately.

"She did odd jobs, and brought the twins up healthy."

"I remember the Painsville business," said Mr. Holiday, "because I own stock in that bank. You only took about two hundred dollars."

"That was all I needed," said the man. "It saved the missus and the kids--so what's the odds?"

"But don't you intend to pay it back?"